Owning the 'Haunt'
by hallow777
Summary: Castle bought 'The Old Haunt' but what does he plan to do with it? How does Beckett take it when she finds out she is involved in those plans? Starts right where "Last Call" 3X10 left off.
1. Coowning the 'Haunt'

**I tried to resist doing this one, I really did. I waited all day for someone to upload something like it so that I wouldn't have to do it but no one did... Why did no one think of this idea?**

**I do NOT own Castle.**

**

* * *

**

Their rendition of the 'Piano Man' lasted all the way down the elevator and into the lobby, where it finally came to the stop when Martha walked up to them.

"Well aren't you guys a happy bunch? Is there some sort of celebration I should have heard of?"

They all moved apart from each other and Castle moved closer to his mother. "We are heading out to The Old Haunt drink one of the best scotches that we will ever taste in our lives."

From behind him, the two male detectives and captain called out that they would meet him there and headed out to their cars while Martha slipped her arm around his. "Scotch isn't my favorite, I'd prefer a nice red wine any day, but I'd be a fool to let such an opportunity slip by. I _am _ invited to this little gathering, aren't I?"

"Of course, mother." With his arm still in hers, he turned then towards the doorway and started heading out when Beckett stepped up on his other side.

"Come on, I'll drive."

Not wanting to argue with that, the three of them piled into her Crown Vic and headed down to the bar.

* * *

An hour later, they were all seated in the largest booth at the bar, completely content after having experienced what was indeed the best scotch ever.

Despite having been hesitant about coming along earlier, Becket was having a pretty good time. She was currently comfortably slouched in her seat between Ryan and Castle, watching Lanie chew Esposito out about something had just said about her.

Castle had called up the good doctor while they were on their way to the bar, and Lanie was happy to join them.

Beckett knew she should be heading home soon but just couldn't find a good enough excuse to leave. Not that she really wanted to anyway.

Once Lanie and Esposito were through arguing, the Captain asked Castle what he planned to do with the bar.

"Just do my best to keep it open I guess. I've kept all of the staff except Brian the bartender, I figured I should let him go so he doesn't decide to start skimming again. I sat down and talked to the rest of the staff and from what I gathered, Annie has been pretty much taking care of the place so I put her in charge."

"So what? You just gonna be one of those owners that just hides in the shadows and no one knows who they are?"

Castle just shrugged then grinned at Esposito before replying. "Of course not, then I wouldn't get to use my new super cool, and awesome, basement office."

His response was met with everyone mumbling that they should have known before Ryan spoke up. "So since you own this place, does that mean that drinks are free for your amazing team that has saved your ass multiple times?"

Castle started chuckling at the excited look Esposito got on his face at Ryan's question. "Sure, sure. What happened to 'we're cops, we go to cop bars'?"

"As far as I'm concerned, you're one of us and you own it. That automatically makes it a cop bar."

He accepted that answer and turn his head just in time to see Lanie about to open her mouth, and answered her question before she even got it out of her mouth. "Yes, Medical Examiners and Captains are included in the free drink special."

Both Lanie and the Captain sat back looking pleased and Castle took that opportunity to speak up again.

"But seriously, I really am going to stay a big part of this place. I want it to stay as the amazing place I remember it being and I can't trust leaving it to some one who might end up ruining it, so I will be acting as owner and manager. But seeing as I can't even manage my own check book, it's a good thing I have Detective Beckett here to keep me in line as the co-owner."

He gestured towards Beckett who had just been about to take a drink. She closed her eyes for a minute, then slowly lowered her glass back to the table and turned to the writer.

"What now?"

"Oh, you mean I didn't tell you? I could have sworn I told you earlier... Uh, surprise?" He did a little jazz hand motion as if that would somehow make it all better, but she just continued to glare at him.

"Well would you look at that? I think it's time I should be getting home. See you all tomorrow." The Captain nodded to each of them in goodnight before heading out the door. Deciding that that was a very good idea, Lanie and the guys headed out right after him, leaving Castle all alone with Beckett.

"Oh come on! Cowards! See if I ever share expensive, and priceless, liquor with you again!"

"Castle." At the sound of her voice, he turned his attention back to Beckett who was still glaring at him, but a little less forcefully than she was before.

"You didn't even think to ask me before deciding this? I'm not having anything to do with your little bar owning adventure."

"Come on, Beckett! Haven't you ever dreamed of owning your own bar?" She could honestly say that she had never dreamed of that and he seemed to realize that. "You, detective, are no fun at all. Fine, you don't have to do anything."

"Glad we got that settled. Goodnight, Castle." She pushed at him a little to make him get up so she could slide out of the booth, slipping her coat back on as she did so.

"Wait, here." He dug around in his pocket and pulled out a cherry key-chain with a few keys on it.

"What are these for?"

Holding it up to eye level, he started pointing to each key. "This one is to the basement, I had a lock installed on it. This one goes to the front door, this is for the back, and this is for a storage room in the back. And this one, I have absolutely no clue what it's for."

As she let out a long sigh, she wondered if anything she said actually stayed in that head of his. "Castle, I just said-"

He cut her off before she could say more by taking her hand and placing the keys in them. "I know. You don't have to do anything. I just need you to keep these keys so that when I lose mine, or get locked out, I know where to find the spares."

She knew she shouldn't take them, shouldn't give into him but she found herself pocketing the keys anyway. Oh she knew she was going to regret this.

* * *

Much to her surprise, it had been a week since he bought the place and yet he hadn't mentioned anything else about her being the co-owner.

They had just finished up a new case and after catching the scumbag, Ryan and Esposito were just itching to get down to the 'Haunt', as it has been dubbed, now that they actually had an excuse to go there.

Deciding that she could use a drink, she agreed when they asked if she wanted to come with them and they all headed out. Ten minutes later she was pulling into the back parking lot that Castle had told them they could use, when they stopped by, so they wouldn't have to fight for parking spaces.

Despite the fact that the boys had left a few minutes earlier than she had, they arrived at the same time and walked in together. Right into the middle of a bar fight.

Her trained cop eye picked out the source of the problem as a burly biker guy who was making a racket over something. Beckett signaled to the guys to go around to the other side of the bar and she sidled up by Eddie the piano man and he informed her that the guy 'Big Mike' and his tantrums were a normal occurrence here. Apparently because Donny didn't want to call the cops before, he'd just pay Mike and he'd leave but since Donny wasn't the owner anymore, no one was sure what to do so they just stayed clear of him.

Catching Ryan's eye from across the room, she gave them another signal and they converged on the biker guy until they wrestled him out the door. Once he was clear of the doorway, he rounded on her.

"What the hell, lady? What the hell you do that for? I's just havin' a little ain't got no right to take my fun away."

"I happen to have ownership of this place, and I'm a cop so I think I have every right to 'ruin your fun' as you call it. Now leave, show up here again and I'll arrest you so fast you won't know what happened." She flashed her badge at him and either that, or Ryan and Esposito standing next to her like menacing body guards, scared him and he hightailed it out of there.

When they headed back into the bar, they were greeted with cheering and applause and while Ryan and Esposito were eating up the attention, she made her way up to the bar to talk to Annie.

"Hey, I assume you tried to call Castle?" At the woman's nod she continued. "He's stuck in some publicity meeting and probably couldn't answer the phone so next time you can't get a hold of him, call me. But please, try to get a hold of him first."

"Sure thing. That was pretty awesome how you guys got him out of here like that. What can I get you?"

"He's not the biggest thing we've taken down before. I think I'll just take a beer, and I have no idea what they want but I guess they will make their way over here when they get through hamming it up for the audience." Beckett looked over her shoulder at the two detectives who were having fun demonstrating proper take down techniques in the middle of the floor for the slightly drunk, but interested, bar patrons.

She sat at the bar and watched them for a little bit before the phone rang behind the bar. Annie was off taking care of customers and the other bartenders were busy as well so she just let it ring.

Not even ten seconds after it stopped ringing did it start again so she gave in and walked around to answer it.

"You've reached The Old Haunt."

There was silence for a few seconds and she was considering hanging up when a familiar voice finally spoke up.

"Beckett? Is that you?"

"It's extremely busy in here and so is Annie, so I thought I could at least answer the phone for her."

"Ha! I'll make a co-owner out of you yet! But uh, you don't happen to know why there are lots of missed calls from the bar on my phone do you?"

"Actually I do, apparently there was a guy called 'Big Mike' who Donny used to pay off so that he wouldn't break everything in the bar. The guys and I closed that latest case and decided to celebrate here so we took care of him. You're welcome."

"You make such a good co-" With a click, she hung up on him and went back to enjoying her beer.

* * *

It had been a couple of weeks since the incident with 'Big Mike' and she'd been to the Haunt way too often. Every chance they got, Ryan and Esposito were heading over there and more often than not, she accompanied them. Despite refusing to acknowledge that she was the co-owner, she still felt a responsibility to it and used their trips to the bar as an excuse to make sure things were running smoothly.

But tonight she was determined to get some of the recently neglected paperwork done so she'd settled into her desk with a fresh cup of coffee and got to work.

She got a whole two pages done before her phone started ringing.

"Beckett."

"Detective Beckett? It's Alexis, have you seen my dad around lately?"

Surprisingly, she hadn't. "Can't say I have. Have you tried calling him?"

"I have. But he won't tell me where he is."

"Why do you need to know where he is? Are you okay?" She couldn't help but be a little concerned for the young girl.

"No, no I'm fine. Well sort of anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"Um..." There was sounds coming through the phone that sounded like she was moving around so Beckett waited until she stopped moving and was rewarded when she spoke again, this time in a low whisper.

"Gina is here and is driving me nuts. Apparently dad is late submitting a rough draft of his new book or something and she's trying to hunt him down. Normally I let them argue it out, but now that they are dating again, she seems to think that complaining and whining to me about him is going to make me magically make him reappear. So I was really hoping you'd seen him."

Beckett thought about it for a minute and though she hadn't really seen him much today, she had an idea where he could be.

"I might have an idea where he is. I'll go check it out and try to convince him to face her, for your sake."

"Thank you, you are a life saver."

They hung up and she glanced down at her paperwork before sweeping it all up and tucking it away into her bag for her to tackle later. Right now she had a writer to find.

* * *

Beckett walked into the bar and was quickly greeted by the staff and some of the regulars who were starting to recognize her from the many times she had been in there. When asked if she wanted a drink, she replied in the negative and headed towards the back of the bar where the entrance to the basement was located.

She pulled out the key and inserted it into the lock which when turned, released a lever that allowed her to pull out and turn the switch that opened the basement door. She walked down the steps quickly, glad that he had that ladder replaced, and shut the door behind her before walking down the other set of stairs to see Castle spread out in the new comfy office chair with his laptop on his lap.

"I thought you would be here."

Clearly not expecting anyone to come down there, he nearly threw his laptop off his lap when her voice startled him.

"Beckett? What are you doing here?"

"Your daughter ask me to come find you before Gina drove her nuts." No use beating around the bush, she wanted to get home sometime soon.

"Seriously? I knew Gina was there asking about me but I didn't think it was so bad that she'd have to send you after me."

"She sounded pretty desperate on the phone."

He looked torn between wanting to rescue his daughter and wanting to stay hidden down here forever.

So she took the choice away from him.

"If you don't go now, I'll call her and tell her about your new hiding place."

"You wouldn't!" The look of horror that graced his face nearly made her laugh, but she kept it together.

"I would."

"Fine, you win." Castle snapped his laptop shut then headed out of the basement, giving her a little half glare on the way out.

Beckett turned, intending to follow him out, but stopped when the chair he had just vacated caught her eye. She listened as he opened the door to the basement and the sounds from the bar came flooding in but as soon as he shut it, there was silence.

Looking around the room, she realized how cozy it was when it wasn't a potential crime scene. Taking a seat in the comfy chair, she pulled out her paperwork from her bag and started working on it again, this time with no distractions, thinking that maybe being the co-owner wasn't so bad after all.

* * *

**If you are wondering about Alexis, just assume that she went home after walking her friend to the train station. So yup, this was random. The idea came to me immediately after Castle said he bought the place and it took me hours to get to sleep last night because I kept thinking about it. Then at like 4 in the morning I randomly woke up and couldn't go back to sleep for a while because my brain was already thinking about it again and would not shut up.**

**Oh, and if you were confused about the ladder/stairs thing. If you notice when Castle and Beckett go down into the basement the second time, you see that there is a ladder that you have to climb down when you first go into the basement to reach the stairs. In this story he replaces the ladder and added more stairs so you can just walk straight down, instead of having to climb down the ladder first.**

**I sort of had a few more ideas for this chapter but they are kinda far out there so I don't know if I will continue this or not, I think I kinda have enough on going (read: neglected) stories already so I don't know.**

**Then again, I'm not exactly known for my will power to resist doing another story so we will see.**


	2. Decorating the 'Haunt'

**Yes, another Christmas related story. I bet you guys are all tired of them, aren't you? This chapter is just random. It doesn't necessarily take place right after the events of the first chapter of this story. It's just kinda there... Which is probably confusing to you guys but what I'm trying to say is that if there were more chapters to this story, it wouldn't really matter where this chapter fit in at.**

**Okay, I've obviously been up too long. Here's hoping the fic itself actually makes sense.**

**Also, this is a (belated) Fanfiction Christmas Present for all my readers! **

**I do NOT own Castle.**

* * *

"I need your help."

Beckett looked up from her paperwork to see Castle standing by her desk, looking anxiously at her.

"With what?" She asked, wondering what kind of crazy plan he had come up with this time. Since it was a week until Christmas, there was no telling what he had come up with.

"I want to get a tree for the Old Haunt but since it's so close to Christmas they won't deliver anymore so I borrowed a truck, but it's too short so someone is going to have to ride in the back with the tree to make sure it doesn't slide out."

"And why should I help you?"

"Because no one else will. I already tried to bribe Esposito and Ryan into helping but Ryan's got something planned with Jenny, and Esposito apparently has plans as well. Please? All you have to do is make sure the tree makes it to the bar, then you can come back and waste your night away doing paperwork."

He was looking at her with his version of the 'puppy dog pout' and it didn't take her long to decide that doing this for him would be a lot less painful than saying 'no' and have him whining about it for days.

So with a sigh, she replied. "Fine, but I'm driving, you are riding with the tree."

"I wouldn't have it any other way."

Castle waited by her desk as she went to explain to the Captain that she would be back later, though he told her she didn't have to, then they headed out into the cold to get the tree.

* * *

Two hours later, they finally had the tree loaded into the truck and were on their way to the 'Haunt'.

When she agreed to this, she assumed that he had already picked out the tree, and that they just had to pick it up. But of course, things are never that simple with Castle and he insisted they spend an hour, in the freezing cold, looking for the 'perfect' tree.

As retribution for not mentioning that small fact, she was now gleefully hitting every pothole she could find, just to hear him complain about it from his place with the tree. The 'perfect' tree ended up being one of the biggest they had and it just barely fit in the back of the old pick-up truck. It seemed to be staying there pretty well, with all the ropes they had to secure it, but they definitely did not want it falling off in the middle of busy New York streets, so Castle stayed in the back to keep an eye on it.

Thirty minutes, and hundreds of potholes, later, they were pulling up to the back entrance of the bar.

While Castle climbed out of the back of the truck and stretched his nearly frozen limbs, Beckett headed inside to make sure it was clear for them to bring it in.

It took ten minutes, a few extra staff members, and lots of wrestling with the tree before they finally got the tree standing straight in the corner.

"Here, thought you might like a drink after all that." Castle said as he appeared from behind the bar with a glass for her, and one for him.

"Thanks." She took the offered drink, then took a look around the deserted bar. "Wow, you must be a worse owner than I thought. This place is deserted."

"That's because it's closed right now." At her questioning look, he continued. "I figured it would be easier to decorate without people running all over the place. The workers that were here just a few minutes ago were just cleaning up, I bet they've already left."

He sat his now empty glass on a nearby table and headed over to a huge pile of what looked like decorations, that she hadn't noticed until now.

"Okay, you are free to go now. I promised you could go back to work after we got the tree up so I called a cab for you, it should be here in a few minutes. I'll see you tomorrow. Oh and by the way? If you happen to get an early morning murder call, please be kind and don't wake me up. I'm sure I'll be up half the night working on these decorations."

"Alright, goodnight Castle."

He gave a small wave before diving into the boxes of newly bought decorations while she headed out the front door to wait for the cab.

True to his word, the cab showed up just a few minutes later. She should have hopped in and had the driver take her back to the precinct so she could do her job, but instead she found herself turning down the cab and using her rarely used keys to go back through the front door that had locked behind her when she came out.

When she walked back into the bar, Castle was already surrounded by open boxes and decorations and she took great pleasure in the girly shriek he let out when she silently walked up behind him and said his name.

"Geez Beckett! Are you trying to give me a heart attack?"

Instead of answering his question, she brushed it off and asked one of her own. "Why did you buy so much stuff? You are going to be here all night at this rate."

"Yeah well, I wanted it to look festive. Has the cab not arrived yet? You can take the truck if you want, I'll probably end up spending the night here anyway."

"I sent the cab away." She said while taking off her suit jacket and rolling up her shirt sleeves. "You made me stand out in the cold for an hour while we found the 'perfect' tree and then we had to haul the damn thing in here. I think I deserve to get to decorate it."

"By all means then." Castle gestured at some boxes that were near the tree and she started opening them.

He was shocked, and slightly confused, but didn't question her, and instead, started hanging up some of the garland he had bought.

They worked in silence for a little while until Castle started to hear a soft sound. Even being the observant writer he was, it still took him a few minutes to figure out exactly what it was.

"Why detective Beckett, are you _humming_? And it even sounds like a Christmas song."

She wouldn't answer that question, but the soft sound immediately stopped, so he knew he was right.

Chuckling to himself, he went over to the sound system and set it to play various Christmas songs over the speakers.

Deciding that he had had enough of hanging garland for a while, Castle moved over to the tree and started helping her hang the various ornaments he had bought.

Beckett had just finished up a box of multicolored bulbs and was opening another box of ornaments, only these were not exactly your average Christmas ornaments.

She picked two out of the box and held the beer glass and wine glass ornaments up to eye level and raising an eye brow at him.

"I thought they were fitting." He said with a shrug, so she merely shook her head and they continued decorating the tree until every limb had either a normal ornament, or a bar related ornament hanging off of it.

Once that was done, they took a small break and had a glass of wine apiece before they set about decorating the rest of the bar.

They argued about which decoration should go where, but when didn't they argue over something? They talked about random things while they worked and everything was going fine until Beckett took some of the empty boxes out to the trash.

When she stepped out into the cold, she was surprised to see a decent layer of snow on everything, since it hadn't been snowing when they first got here.

Which meant there was a pretty good chance that Castle had no idea it was snowing.

Thinking that she had clearly been around the man-child too long, she quickly got rid of the trash and gathered up a nice pile of snow that she quickly formed into a ball.

She hurried back into the bar with her snowball, silently sneaking up on the writer who was too busy singing to Christmas carols to pay attention to her.

Beckett stopped right behind him and before he even knew what was happening, she pulled out the collar of his shirt and dropped it in, squishing it against his back for the full effect.

She quickly jumped back as he started flailing around and hollering, trying to get the snow out of his shirt until finally, he gave up and just took his shirt off.

"Sorry Castle, it was too good to pass up."

"I've been rubbing off on you, and I'm not entirely sure that's a good thing anymore."

Castle grumbled at her some more on his way down to the basement office to change into a shirt that wasn't soaked in snow, very thankful that he started keeping extra clothes down there.

When he came back out with a fresh shirt on, they got back to work and were finally done an hour later.

They hauled out the rest of the boxes together only to find that there was even more snow on the ground now.

She knew what he was thinking, even before he did.

"Castle, don't you dare. I don't have extra clothes here so-" She was cut off by the cold, wet ball of snow hitting her in the chest.

"Oops, sorry. It slipped." He lied as he ducked behind the trashcan. Beckett quickly gathered up a ball of her own and repaid him, soaking another of his shirts.

Their snowball fight could have lasted for hours, but it was too cold, and too late, to stay out for long.

When they went back inside, Beckett was reminded of why she didn't want to get into a snow fight in the first place.

"Great, now I have to go home in a wet shirt."

"I've got two dry shirts left, you can borrow one."

"Okay."

"But..." Of course there had to be a 'but' with him.

"What, Castle?"

"I was thinking you might as well stay here tonight." She immediately opened her mouth to protest but he held up his hand and continued on. "I know, I know. But if you haven't noticed, it's two-thirty in the morning and it's also snowing pretty heavily out there. I'm just saying it would be easier than going all the way back to your apartment."

Normally, there was no way she would even consider it, but it was very cold outside, and very warm in the bar, and she wasn't really looking forward to leaving the warmth. The multiple glasses of wine she had had over the course of the evening, and the holiday spirit, left her in a pretty good mood as well.

"Oh yes, I'm sure the booths will be _very_ comfortable to sleep in."

He smirked at that. "Well you could sleep in one of the booths, if you really wanted to, but there is no need since there is a comfy bed downstairs."

"And share it with you? No way, I'll take my chances with the booths. Wait, you put a bed in the office?"

"I'll sleep on the couch. And yes I did. Which you would have known, if you had actually visited this place in the last week."

That was a barely concealed jab at the fact that they had barely seen each other at all the past week since Josh had been off work a lot so she had been spending lots of time with him.

"Fine."

"Perfect! Go ahead and go down stairs, the shirts are in the closet and you can pick which ever one you like. I'm going to make sure everything is locked up."

She nodded then headed down to the basement office that managed to look cozier every time she visited. The furniture had been rearranged so that a full-sized bed could fit in the corner without the room seeming crowded.

Beckett opened the closet, picked out one of the shirt and turned to head back up the stairs so she could change in the bathroom when she noticed a door that wasn't there before. Curiosity got the better of her and she opened it to find that Castle had apparently had a bathroom added on since she was here last.

She quickly made use of the bathroom, changed out of her wet shirt, then climbed into the bed. Once she was securely under the covers, she took off her pants so she would be more comfortable, and left them on the bed under the covers so Castle would never know she was in his presence wearing only his shirt.

Castle came downstairs a few minutes later and made himself comfortable on the couch with an extra blanket and pillow he pulled out of the closet.

The couch wasn't too far away from the bed, so it didn't take long for the sound of each other's rhythmic breathing to lull the other to sleep.

* * *

**Okay brain, can I please finish 'Cold Chills' now? I'd really like to finish that one but you don't really seem to be in much of a hurry to finish it... Sigh.**

**I was going to have this as a stand alone oneshot but I figured I might as well just add it to this story instead.**

**I'll be through with the Christmas related things soon, I promise.**


End file.
